


Let your clarity define you

by FhimeChan



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Hannigram - Freeform, M/M, Rites of Passage, Teen!Hannibal, Undefined secondary gender, teen!Will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-22 14:24:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12483672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FhimeChan/pseuds/FhimeChan
Summary: Will has always been alone, especially during celebrations. This time Hannibal finds him.





	Let your clarity define you

**Author's Note:**

> I was helped by [BeginToBlur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeginToBlur/pseuds/BeginToBlur), who graciously offered their help.

A cold wind moves the leaves, dancing with the trees under the stars. The air is dry, carrying a promise of winter, and a full moon shines over the forest, stripping the world of his colours and replacing them with black and silver. 

The forest is ethereal, alien in the darkness, but in its core orange lights are shining. The clearing is just one hour away from the small town, but this night it is the receptacle of rituals old as the earth itself. Year after year, century after century, every generation has passed through that place, on that night, to celebrate the passage to adulthood in a millenary tradition. 

That night boys and girls had carried their traditional carved pumpkin with them, and the spooky faces are now laid down in circle to scare away the misfortune. Only half of them are lit; boys and girls are waiting their turn to advance in the circle, the ceremonial robes shining from the flames, to fend off the threat of darkness with a candle for their lantern. 

The circle is the only source of light, since no artificial device is allowed during the ancient tradition. People are standing around it, relishing in that one pocket of warmth in the cold forest.

Will stands alone at the edge of the clearing where the orange light barely reaches his face. His white robe is almost black in the shadows, but it does not matter because everybody has already seen it. Boys and girls of his age with black, silver and golden robes have followed his ceremonial lighting of the lantern with sad eyes and hushed whispers, while Will forced his head to stay tall and proud, his eyes not to wander over the crowd.

He sought shelter in the darkness immediately after, the only moment of sadness of the ceremony breaking when the girl next in line stepped into the circle, her golden robe shining at the flames. Relief has washed over the crowd while she advanced, the silent permission to rejoice for the start of her life, instead of... 

Will’s train of thought is interrupted when he hears a voice behind him. “Good evening.”

He turns and narrows his eyes, searching the woods behind his back. He thinks he sees movement, then he hears a branch breaking and a boy emerges from the shadows. The boy steps beside him, and turns to look at the circle of pumpkin lanterns.

Will mumbles a barely audible “Evening”, then waits few seconds for the inevitable remark to be tossed at him. He gradually unclenches his hands when nothing happens, the new boy nodding in acknowledgement, quietly staring at the ceremony. He spies at him from the corner of his eyes, and then, when he realises that the same behaviour is the sort that most annoys him, he turns openly to examine his new companion. It is impossible to understand if the robe is alphan golden or omegan silver; it catches the light of the distant lanterns in a orange glint.

It is weird to stay in companionable silence with a boy of his age; Will can not remember another single time when that happened. Even if, it is arguable, it is not a companionable silence since they do not even know each other’s names. Still, there is an easiness in the way that they stay together side by side, alone in the darkness while the others are bathed in light; something that Will’s empathy can not put a name on and that may be just in his mind. 

It is probably to feel the reality of his situation, to check that he is not hallucinating his silent companion that Will blurts out a rushed, “I’m Will.”

A brief curving of the boy’s mouth is the reward for his boldness, followed by the simple, plain answer, “Hannibal.”

Will resists the impulse of trying the name on his tongue to savour its fullness. Hannibal, the conqueror. The only one who approached him in a lifetime, even if only for a convenient observation spot of the ceremony. Appropriate. 

They keep the silence after that exchange, looking at the celebrations. The last boy, in a black beta robe, lights his candle. The eldest woman of the village steps upto the center of the lights and blesses every lantern with her kiss. The ritual ends with a wish of prosperity and fertility, and now it is time to celebrate; more lanterns are lit and in a burst of laughter the music starts to play. 

It should be bitter to be excluded from the general joy, near enough to touch but kept at a distance by his own refusal to be pitied. Will has tasted them, the fake smiles easy to see through, the pity when at fifteen he was still not gendered, a mere kid in the society’s eye. He got used to the hushed whispers and to the glances that his empathy did not allow him to ignore when he hit his sixteenth birthday, his seventeenth, and finally his eighteenth, and all the while he was still wearing the kid’s white robe. But Hannibal’s presence somehow filters beyond his consciousness, and for once Will does not feel alone, even if he realizes that he should not be affected so much by a mere stranger standing beside him. 

He is taken completely by surprise when Hannibal says, “Shall we dance?”, in a casual tone, as if it is not the most extraordinary thing ever happened in Will’s life. 

“Why?” he almost choke on this word, his common sense denying the reality of what he has just heard.  _ I’m not an alpha, I’m not an omega, I can’t even say that I’m a beta. Why are you bothering with me?  _ It should be a joke, a last cruel prank for him in the day when the other boys and girls assume officially their genders, and he is still… nothing.

Hannibal hesitates, a second in which he considers Will’s utter and devastating beauty when he has approached the circle of lights, how he caught his eyes for just a moment, reading in the iron composure the potential for unending violence. A single dark glimpse which had intrigued him enough to follow Will in the shadows and that is actively pushing him towards the boy. 

He settles for, “Because I wish to,” an answer almost rude in his simplicity, so different from his usual ones. 

Will stays still, a painful tension in his face as he searches Hannibal’s expression, looking for the mocking that he knows should be there, but that he can not find, not even reaching out with his empathy. What he sees instead is a firm determination and deep eyes reflecting the orange of the lanterns. 

The silence stretches, tense, raw moments when Will fights his instinct to hide, to run away from the potential of happiness for the fear of being burned. But Will has never withdrawn from a fight, so he straightens his head and offers his hand. 

Hannibal takes it, a smile forcing his way on his face in spite of his attempt to hide it. There is genuine glee in him, and Will can not do anything else but return it. They hold eye contact as they walk towards the light, and there is a quiet exhilaration in how Will does not care about the colours of his robes, or Hannibal’s, or the others’ glances. A single bubble of happiness blooms around them as they take their place in the dance, laughing, the lantern lights painting both of their robes orange. 


End file.
